Stromae‘s Racine Carrée has spent a great 17 weeks at Number One, and is the best-selling album in France in 2013 with 1,159,320 sales. Since 2001, only three albums had sold more than one million copies in a calendar year : in 2002 with Patrick Bruel‘s Entre Deux (1,118,800), the soundtrack from Les Choristes in 2004 (1,058,000), and Renaud with Boucan D’Enfer in 2002 (1,034,169). In 2011, Adele‘s 21 was very close with 995,618 copies sold.
They had the biggest one-week-sales in May (195,013), Daft Punk are at number two with Random Access Memories (509,209 sales), the album was at the top for three consecutive weeks in May and June. That LP was never Number One, but it was inside the top 30 for its 32 weeks : Maître Gims sold 497,513 copies of Subliminal.
It’s not surprising to find Les Enfoirés in the top five, at four with La Boîte A Musique Des Enfoirés which spent five weeks at Number One in March and April (421,200 sales). Only peaking at four in August but number five in 2013, Bruno Mars‘ Unorthodox Jukebox has spent the whole year inside the top 30 (419,459 sales).
In 2013 Zaz has confirmed the success of her eponymous debut album, 390,005 copies of Recto Verso have been sold. It’s not 2007 anymore, when Mon Paradis had sold 713,916 copies, but Christophe Maé‘s Je Veux Du Bonheur sold a robust 388,325 copies. The album Génération Goldman is at number eight with 291,517 sales, the second volume is at eleven.
Florent Pagny only released Vieillir Avec Toi in November, but it’s already at number nine with 279,374 copies sold. The musical Robin Des Bois sold around 279,000 copies and is at number ten. Tal had a great 2013, she owns two albums inside the top 25 : at 13 with A L’Infini (214,661 sales), and at 21 with Le Droit De Rêver (143,849 sales).
These albums are not in this year’s top 10, but were very successful : We Love Disney (208,748 sales in four weeks), Les Stentors‘ Une Histoire De France (181,192), Vincent Niclo with Luis (142,485), Odysseus by Luc Arbogast (138,680), Keen’V with Ange Ou Démon (123,123), and Thérèse / Vivre D’Amour (107,579), among others.
Some established acts have shown that they can still sell albums : Pascal Obispo‘s best-of Millésimes sold 164,139 copies, and his new studio LP Le Grand Amour more than 125,000 in four weeks. In this category, you can also find Depeche Mode with Delta Machine (127,813), David Bowie‘s The Next Day (126,047 / number two in March), Texas with The Conversation (88,807), Les Chansons De L’Innocence Retrouvée by Etienne Daho (82,527), and Placebo with Loud Like Love (57,945).
Other established acts struggled in 2013 : Justin Timberlake (The 20/20 Experience), and will.i.am (#willpower) sold only 50,000 copies this year. Lady Gaga‘s ARTPOP was inside the ten best-sellers for just one week (peaking at three), and only 48,820 copies were sold in seven weeks. Only three weeks in the top 50, Sting‘s The Last Ship sold 28,243 copies. Paul McCartney‘s New has not reached the 30,000, and even with the big hit “Blurred Lines”, Robin Thicke has not sold more than 26,000 copies of the album of the same name. Britney Jean is Britney Spears‘ first studio LP not to have reached the top 20 (peaking at number 22), the album sold 22,839 copies in four weeks. Will 2014 be better for her ?
French music charts 